Let's get the show on the road my Quirkless friends.
Two Years Later.
Evelyn stood in front of the Lincoln Hero High School. She held herself confidently, dressed in the standard white blouse and navy-blue mini skirt that was the school uniform. Her similarly blue tie hung neatly from her neck, halfway down the buttons was a glossy metal badge pinned to her blouse. It was in the shape of shield, with gryphons flanking each side like a family crest. In the middle was the number "28."
She held her limp school bag in her right hand and covered her eyes with her left to block out the sunlight as she observed the school.
It was a huge school, easily five floors and had gigantic facilities dedicated to the training and grooming of future heroes. The school was recently renovated, and had an industrial look to it which was combined with gigantic wall-to-wall glass windows. A brick foundation and metal fencing covered the perimeter, along with campus security guards positioned in guard houses that dotted the walls.
Students poured in around her, heading to their first period class. Mothers and fathers dropped off their kids, while older teens drove into the underground parking lot. Buses came in through a metal double-door gate, and they took a different road that also led underground. She spotted some lower classed heroes patrolling the perimeter. There was NightSmoke in her iconic purple and black latex, along with Krieger who sported a tank top and shorts to show off his bulking muscles.
'Quite the security. Makes sense though.' Evelyn thought, remembering that it was a common tactic of organized villains to target institutions that harbored heroes and would-be heroes to spread fear and terror. There were plenty of pro heroes inside the school, the security was lax because of the recent huge downtick of crown due to the heroes efforts.
"Hey look, it's her."
"Isn't she the hero-hater?"
"Why is she even here?"
"I hear she's crazy."
"Yeah, she's also ugly too."
"I mean she's quirkless after all."
Students around her began gossiping instantly as soon as they recognized her. She was notorious for being the only quirkless who fought so incessantly against those who had quirks. This reputation followed her through middle school, and now as a freshman to LHHS, her notoriety had remained intact.
A bulky jock broke out from the crowd and approached her. His dress shirt that was his uniform barely stayed together, the fabric was pulling so hard at the buttons in an attempt to not rip apart. His ocean blue eyes and short blonde hair accentuated the preppy look by ten fold. He was flanked by a boy and a girl on each side. The boy wore black eye shadow and had black hair that swept to one side covering his right eye. He had multiple piercings on his face, including his lips and nose. The girl had chocolate brown skin and long pink hair around a thin frame. Unlike Evelyn, her knee-high stockings were strangely loose. She noticed her skin had tiny diamond shapes that ran up and down covering every visible surface, and her eyes were a bright green with slitted pupils.
"You're the quirkless trouble-maker, aren't you?" The blonde asked, the apparent leader of the trio. Evelyn already felt her blood begin to simmer by the self-righteous snobbiness that exhumed out of the blonde. A crowd began forming around the group, with adequate distance should a brawl break out. Evelyn huffed, glancing between the three.
"And?" She simply asked back, her annoyance so apparent it practically dripped off of her.
"I'm Sebastian Lison, Disciplinary Officer of the student council here at Lincoln Hero High. This is So-"
"SoundSorrow," the goth interjected; his voice dragged out as if speaking was a monumental obstacle.
"Yes, SoundSorrow" Sebastian continued nonchalantly, and then gestured to the female.
"And this is-"
"Ssscarpent." The girl hissed, also interjecting the leader. Her voice was full of attitude. Sebastian's eyebrow twitched, he took a deep breath in an attempt to relax his clenched jaw. Evelyn would have laughed at the disorganized introduction and obvious insubordination if it didn't seem like a fight would break out any second.
"Nice to meet you, I'm 'get out of my way I'm going to be late for class.'" Evelyn replied and angled herself to walk around the goth. As she started walking Sebastian moved in front of her, holding up a thick and callused hand to block her path. She eyed it, before glancing at his face with a glare.
"Not so fast, Evelyn. I wanted to lay down some ground rules of the school since your track record is pretty well known."
He wasn't wrong. Throughout the last two years she had been expelled from every middle school in her region. She had to take a bus to schools further away from where she lived to even progress far enough to get to high school. She had been in at least three dozen fights. All of which were on her record and she had to go to Juvie for at least 3 of them.
"Let me lay down some rules with you." Evelyn replied. "You s-"
"No, you don't get to make them." Sebastian sternly said, running her off of her sentence. "I've heard of the fights you've gotten in, and while I respect your record understand something." His tone growing darker and deeper with every word he said.
"Lincoln Hero High is not like those other schools you've attended. I don't know how you got here, but we're the best in the country. Stay in line, and don't mess with the heroes here." He glared at Evelyn, the buttons on his dress shirt bulged as the sound of the fabric was gently stretching.
'He's huge, can't face him head on.' Evelyn thought, priming herself to get into battle mode. She noticed that the hair on his neck stood straight up, which meant he was ready to fight too.
The crowd became restless, they whispered to each other and had smart phones already out to record.
Evelyn looked up at the giant, he was easily a head above her in height. She smirked at him, cocking her head to the side while she did so.
"You've got this all wrong. I'm here to keep you in line. Now move, before someone gets hurt." She shot at him. The crowd collectively 'ooed' in response, prompting a vein to nearly pop out of Sebastian's forehead. His face became flushed in anger. Milky white skin turned as red as a tomato and the disciplinary captain gritted his teeth. He growled while his glare intensified at the quirkless dirty blonde who dared to defy him.
"That's it, you're coming with me. Physical threats of violence are not tolerated here." He reached for Evelyn's arm and tried to grab it. She quickly jerked her hand back, jumping backwards a step as she scowled at him.
"I'm not going anywhere with you. Go away, and don't touch me." She cooly said, her voice low and threatening. Sebastian's eyebrow twitched, the vein that was bulging on his forehead looked like it was about to burst. His frown was so deep on his face that it looked like it was going to carve permanent features on his cheeks.
"You don't get to object." He said, nostrils flaring. He reached again for her arm, this time grasping her left wrist successfully. The next chain of events that happened afterwards went so fast, half of the crowd barely saw it.
Instinct and reflexes priming into overdrive, Evelyn twisted against his grasp, sweeping a leg hard against the lower right of his calf while grabbing a fistful of hair on the back of his head and yanking downwards. His grip didn't loosen while he plummeted face forward to the ground, so while she was twisting, she leapt forward, swinging herself around his back and tucked an arm under his neck. They fell on the ground, Sebastian with a surprised look on his face as he planted onto the concrete and Evelyn establishing a choke-hold from behind.
"I said don't touch me!" Evelyn yelled, making sure others heard her clearly. He groaned in pain, which quickly turned to anger. His bulky arms moved to push himself off the ground. He was easily lifting her despite her pressuring his windpipe. 'Damn jocks.' She thought trying her best to put more pressure on the sleeper hold, locking her arms together to strengthen the force.
Sebastian stood up completely despite Evelyn's efforts. He snuck a hand into her hold, and pried her off with minimal difficulty, even doing so while using just one arm. The buttons on his shirt finally popped off, and his movements caused his dress shirt to rip along the sleeves. He was much bulkier than what Evelyn had initially suspected. She knew he was strong, but this was ridiculous, even if he was a bodybuilder.
'If I even get hit once by him, it's light's out.' She noted.
As he pulled her arm free, his other arm reached up so he could grab her and rid himself of the troublemaker. She capitalized on the awkward angle of his arm, and jumped from his back. Using gravity and her acrobatic prowess, she grabbed his hand and spun so that she could kick his shins while simultaneously creating an arm-bar.
They fell to the ground again, this time she had his arm stretched as far as possible while holding it close to her. She pulled as hard as she could, and squeezed her thighs around his shoulder to lock them into a favorable position. She aimed to dislocate his shoulder at the very least, since the other three were most likely going to support him at any second. Quirkless or not, she didn't think she could take on all three at once.
"Agh, you bitch!" He yelled, groaning in pain at the powerful strain he felt. Despite their size variance, the pain he felt was excruciating. What frustrated him even further was that he couldn't retaliate in this position, regardless of the fact he was easily twice as strong as she was.
Evelyn looked at the other two, continually pulling at Sebastian to incapacitate him or at the very least disable an arm. Yet, though she was in complete control, her instincts screamed at her in warning. She looked up at the other two members of the disciplinary committee. The goth and the girl were staring at her in a relaxed posture, not even bothering to help their friend. But what really unnerved Evelyn was that they had this brimming look of consequence as if Evelyn was the one in danger, not Sebastian.
Suddenly, the smell of burning plastic and a searing hot pain jolt through her whole body. Evelyn cried in pain, letting go of Sebastian and rolled away from him in an instant. She gasped for breath, moaning as she looked down at her legs and arms, where she felt pulsing waves of stabbing discomfort wash up from her limbs.
She gaped at what she saw.
Her skin had long shining red burn marks that ran up her thighs and forearms. She breathed through gritted teeth, trying her best to stifle the coursing ache from the long burn marks and forming blisters along her body.
She looked over at Sebastian, his entire sleeve and collar of his dress shirt was a shriveled black against his beet red skin. He got up steadily, rotating his arm and stretching it while giving Evelyn a satisfied smirk. Evelyn ground her teeth together, bearing the torturous pain that continued to remind her that she was suffering nearly third-degree burns. She didn't know what kind of quirk he had, but she assumed it had to do something with contact heat manipulation. If she had gotten burned this bad after instantly letting go, what would happen if he blasted her full force while he had a chokehold on her?
"I didn't want to do that, but you gave me no choice." Sebastian calmly said, glowering over her with a relaxed stance. "You can't defeat me, my quirk alone sets us worlds apart." He stated, in a matter-of-fact sort of way that rubbed Evelyn the wrong way. "You touch me. You get burned."
Looking back at herself, the burns ran from the underside of her knee up to her underwear, coupled with damage that spanned from the palm of her hands down to her elbows.
Just by activating his quirk, he brought her combat effectiveness down dramatically. Evelyn got up with difficulty, her carefulness to not let her wounds touch the ground made her movements clunky and awkward.
"Again, I admire your fighting spirit. I would have respected it if you weren't so unruly. But the difference is as clear as day, you cannot even hope to defeat me without a quirk." He crossed his arms, shaking his head at her.
Snickering from the crowd echoed in their small huddle. Evelyn bared her teeth, growing sufficiently pissed at the mantra that kept being repeated to her over and over. She began laughing. First softly, before letting herself go.
Sebastian narrowed his eyes at her, forming fists and raising his arms in a half-defensive posture.
"You keep telling yourself that baby story if it lets you sleep at night. But I'm about to give you a reality check, you piece of shit." She spat towards his feet, flexing her fingers. It hurt quite a bit, but she was used to the pain. The pain of being beaten down again, and again. This was nothing.
The audience murmured amongst themselves, another round of 'oohs' came from them. They didn't believe her, watching with pity as they saw her as an insignificant fly pointlessly fighting death in the web of a king spider.
She would show them. Just like she showed everyone else before.
Evelyn broke into a sprint as she dashed towards Sebastian. He formed a simple guard, raising his fists up to his face and jutting his elbows outward in anticipation of her front assault. Evelyn leapt, angling her body and pulling her fist back in a sprinting superman punch.
But she didn't punch. She kept a close watch on his body language, which exhibited that he was awaiting her punch and possible feint into another leg sweep. She had extensively studied martial arts just to help her overcome bigger opponents, but it also translated well against most quirks as they were not often an "answer-all" to most combat situations. If she couldn't touch him with her skin, then she would beat him another way.
In mid-air, she slammed her left foot down on the ground causing her equilibrium to swing herself downward. Pushing the top of her body forward and down like a cartwheel, she caught the ground with her hands, momentarily cussing at the pain before bringing a fast and heavy heel kick to the top of Sebastian's head.
Eyes went wide and mouths were left open at the surprising display of combat acrobatics from the quirkless girl. But she wasn't finished. While Sebastian's head went low from the hit, she kept her foot swinging and twirled like a ballerina, nearly finishing a full circle while remaining on the same foot to deliver a horizontal kick to his face and sending him off his feet and onto the ground.
Her dress shoe felt warm, the heat from his face transferred to her shoe, it provided a barrier from his quirk but it wouldn't last long. She would have to be decisive about how she dealt with the heat jock.
Before she could land both of her feet on the ground, the chocolate-skinned girl dove at her with a pissed expression.
"You want a fight? You got one." Scarpent said, jabbing at Evelyn with fingers scrunched in a clawing motion. Evelyn barely regained her balance from her attack before she had to weave her head, dodging the punk girl with swift movements.
Evelyn noticed something odd in the palm of the girls' hands, but was unable to discern what it was before a swipe at her face threw her thoughts in a mess. She had to parry the attack with the back of her hand because her equilibrium was still off kilter. What she expected to be a simple bump to the back of her hand was instead another ripple of excruciating pain through her entire arm. Evelyn cried out in pain, trying to pull her hand away but it was stuck on something. Looking at her adversary's hand she saw two large translucent fangs protruding from the center and embedding themselves through her skin.
Yelping in surprise, she mustered her strength into a jump kick that dislodged Scarpent from her. The pain began to ebb away, the feeling of it turning into weight. 'Wait, why is it feeling so heavy?' Evelyn thought, before realization struck her and she brought her hand to her mouth, sucking as hard as she could. Mixed with the coppery taste of blood, was an extremely bitter taste that she guessed was some sort of venom. Spitting it out on the floor, she shot a glare at the girl who smiled slyly at Evelyn. She could already feel it's effects sap her of her energy and her locomotion.
"Sssmart, you bought yourself sssome more time. It's a ssshame it won't help." She mocked, winking at Evelyn. Evelyn mentally cursed at herself for not picking up the signs that the girl had an obvious animorphic quirk.
The burning pain from Sebastian disappeared in her left arm, and the whole thing went limp. She tried to raise it, but it didn't respond. It just felt like her whole arm had fallen asleep, the sensation of her dipping her whole arm in a bed of tiny needles stretched from her finger to her shoulder.
"She's mine." Sebastian said from beside Scarpent, his cheek slightly swollen from where she had kicked earlier.
"We hit her together." Scarpent said, looking over at the goth teen who had not joined the fight. He briefly nodded to her, looking over his shoulder.
"Fine. We need to teach her a lesson anyway." Sebastian reluctantly agreed, standing side by side with Scarpent. Evelyn eyed the both of them, slowly backing up as they approached her with malice intent. Though facing two opponents at once was never ideal, what really put her at a disadvantage was losing control of one of her arms. She figured that she could face them equally one-on-one, even two-on-one with a bit of luck and ingenuity, but without her arm she would be hard pressed to even finish one of them.
Scarpent's eyes narrowed for a second, signaling to Evelyn she probably was going to attack first. Shifting her attention to the polymorpher, she prepared for another assault with her hands. This was primarily why she was nearly completely caught off guard when Scarpent's neck stretched out like a rubber band snapping towards her. Scarpent's mouth was open, and the fangs Evelyn remembered all too well from her hands were in her mouth as well.
Evelyn still had the reaction time left in her, and jumped back just in time, nearly toppling herself as she bent low to avoid the sudden bite attempt. She was rewarded with the sound of teeth clanging empty air inches from her face. Unfortunately, because her arm was still comatose, it did not follow her well. As she moved back, the arm moved forward clumsily which gave Sebastian an opportunity to grab it. Clutching onto her wrist like before, he pulled her towards him with such force that she felt herself lift off the ground. In that same motion, he clenched a gigantic fist tightly and drove it hard into Evelyn's cheek, pummeling her to the ground.
There was a sickening crack as her skull smashed against the floor, and people screamed in horror at the sign of blood.
Evelyn felt like if a tornado and a hurricane had a baby, that offspring just hit her in the face with it's entire being. A head splitting headache nearly made her black out, but she knew that she couldn't allow herself to be showed up this quick in the fight. The crowd grew silent as she pushed herself slowly up, her only functioning arm shaking uncontrollably as it struggled to bear her upper body weight. She angrily looked up at Sebastian and Scarpent, who stood over her with menacing expressions.
'I'm surprised not a single teacher has tried to break up this fight yet. What gives?' Evelyn thought, and then another realization dawned on her. 'The goth kid probably has some sort of quirk that is hiding this fight,' she speculated that based off of his name he might have some sort of control over sound.
"You're… both… pathetic." Evelyn said between pants, finally able to push herself into a sitting position. "Can't even… take me… by yourself." She huffed, still trying to catch her breath. She had noted to herself that getting hit by the giant would not have been good, yet she had let it happen anyway.
"Give up already." Sebastian ignored her provocation, crossing his arms. "You're done." Evelyn grunted, smiling despite the pain cocktail she was bathing in. With a tired hand, she raised a middle finger to Sebastian, eliciting laughter from the crowd.
"Go to sleep already." Scarpent complained, and drove her hand towards Evelyn's exposed neck. Evelyn watched as the hand bared fangs and came at her as if the whole thing was in slow motion. Her mind was still sharp, but her body was too weak to react. She closed her eyes, awaiting yet another defeat due to her inability to overcome the handicap she was born with.
Instead of being put to sleep however, she heard a loud mechanical whirring sound and clamps locking onto something. Evelyn heard a bunch of breath intakes as Scarpent angrily hissed in pain.
Opening her eyes, Evelyn saw a mechanical claw with three large pincers holding Scarpent's arm away from her. Connecting to it was a long and thin black metal wire that ran to a silver gauntlet attached to a teen boy's arm. He was taller than Evelyn, probably six feet, had tanned skin, and short jet black hair. A prominent scar on the left side of his face stretched all the way down to the smile he had on his lips.
"Two against one isn't very fair, is it?" His voice was calm and confident. Evelyn saw that he didn't look particularly strong since his body frame was quite thin. "No, I don't think it is."
Suddenly, the simple smile on his face became wicked and his eyes grew hungry. It was as if a switch flipped on his face changing from collected to crazy.
The gauntlet came to life, he dug himself in by bending his knees and lowering his body. Scarpent struggled but against the pulling mechanism and the embedded grappler she couldn't slip away. Then, without warning she stopped resisting and it pulled her effortlessly towards him.
"Poor move boy." Scarpent whispered, and with a shake her legs melted into one long snake tail. As she flew towards the newcomer, the tail coiled down onto the ground, and sprung itself so that she went even faster at the would be rescuer. While in the air, she closed her hands into fists, and the fangs instead came out between her knuckles. She held them ready to punch him with her new configuration as she soared at him at incredible speeds.
"Thought you would do that." He chuckled, and then retracted the hook in an instant to his gauntlet. Without looking he aimed it at an upward angle and fired it behind him, all the while jumping backwards. It connected to a part of the school and instantly began pulling, which in turn lifted the teen out of Scarpent's reach. Immediately after dodging her attack the hook detached and retracted almost instantly and he fired it towards the ground behind her. It struck the concrete, securing itself solidly.
The hook didn't appear to change configurations, but Evelyn was surprised it was able to grab three different surfaces so efficiently.
Using the new anchor point, he changed his trajectory by increasing the gauntlet power ten fold, which rocketed him towards Scarpent instead of away from her. Surprised by his sudden speed, she was nowhere ready for him to be suddenly barreling past her. In that instant, he had a clenched fist ready, and struck her straight in the gut accurately striking her solar plexus. The force was so strong, it stopped him mid in his tracks, transferring all that momentum into a powerful hit that shook his entire body.
Her eyes went wide as she spat out the air she had in her lungs, before toppling over onto the ground completely knocked out. The teen got up, dusting himself off before smiling at Evelyn and Sebastian. In return, they both were glaring at him.
"I didn't ask… for your help." Evelyn breathed, gingerly holding the side of her cheek which was now plump and swollen.
The teen shrugged, the cable and hook retracting back into the gauntlet with a satisfying 'click'.
"We quirkless have to look out for each other, don't we?" He winked, turning his attention to Sebastian and SoulSorrow. He rubbed his hands gingerly, the wicked smile returned to his lips.
"Heh." She snorted, finally having the energy to pull herself onto her feet. Interestingly enough, she began to get the feeling back into her disabled arm. Though the burning pain came back, it was reassuring enough that she was able to wiggle her fingers and bend her elbow freely. She looked at Sebastian and SoundSorrow, a similar smile forming on her own lips.
"I guess you're right."
End Chapter One
Hope you guys like it! I was only able to incorporate ONE OC of the THREE I got because I'm pretty pressed for time. Don't worry you two, I definitely have plans to incorporate your characters (the fight isn't over!) but I wanted to get this out so you could get a little taste of my writing style as it pertains to combat. Let me know what you think!